Rambling, rumbling, rumination

Archive for June, 2010

Bending to my curiosity, I fired up a ten day free trial of The Burning Crusade that is offered to “former or current” players of World of Warcraft. I took the opportunity to start up a Blood Elf Paladin and a Draenei Shaman so I could look around and take a bunch of screenshots. Totally unpredictable, I know.

Mournful lack of originality aside, I realized that I could also play my old friend Padgi for a few more days. So, I fired up another random dungeon and found myself in Blackrock Depths. The players I wound up with were decent, and things went smooth enough, despite the occasional death. Once the Warrior tank got his Force of Magma (I should have rolled Need on it, but didn’t… Ironaya‘s stick is still good enough for me.) from Bael’Gar, he and his Hunter buddy dropped the group. The Mage and Shaman healer soon flitted off as well, leaving me alone in the depths of a hot and Dwarf-infested place.

I’m probably doing it wrong, but it really does just seem like the same thing over and over again, just with different window dressing and loot. It’s fun enough to play through these dungeons at least once, but still… I wish I could play with an elite team of Druids, handling problems their own way, rather than doing the Same Old tank/healer/dps dance. I know, I know, the game isn’t designed for that… but sitting in a corner as a quiet, deadly ninja kitty… I had a glimpse of what I wanted to play, and it was glorious.

Pity I can’t have it… but alas, that’s life.

Yes, yes, I’m sure I could find a Druid guild somewhere, but that’s just part of the equation. The “split up and orchestrate a devious plan of attack” bit is what really appealed to me as I lurked around in the ‘Depths. Yeah, we could come back as level 80 monsters and totally outclass the hapless Dwarfs, but where’s the fun in that?

I’m following Brian’s lead here, in that this is a collection of ideas that you can build on or use outright, if you feel so inclined, not so much a proper design document. Since I currently lack programming skills and the independent wealth to hire someone with said skills, well, I probably won’t be making a game with this anytime soon. So, have at it, and if you can make it better, well, so much the better, aye?

The core notion here is to make magic in a game creative and explorative, trying to evoke the flavor of a magical researcher with a degree in MacGyvering their way through game world problems. Most games that use magic are very, very constrained, effectively giving magical equivalents of tech trees rather than letting magic be wild and variable. Players always know what their magical school can do, since the spells are always the same. Individual magic spells tend to have one use and one use only, with far too many of them slotting into Damage Per Second (or per fight) min/maxing.

I’m looking to push the boundaries a bit. I want players to be able to weave magic into new shapes, not unlike how Dumbledore crafted wholly new magical spells here and there, or how Voldemort was able to do things wildly beyond that universe’s “standard” spell set taught to the students. In my mind, magic is wildly creative (even when dangerously destructive), a practice of curious individuals who seek ways to warp reality and go beyond what merely is into the realm of what may be. Pushing and pulling at threads of magic in the tapestry of a magical reality can and should produce new and interesting effects. I’d like to invite players (more Psychochild and Rampant Coyote!) to indulge in a bit of creativity within the game world’s magic system. I’d like to let them play and have fun.

I’ll admit to being significantly influenced by the description of magic in books like Sabriel (a great book on necromantic magic and how it might work for good) and the Dragon Knight series (whose lead character, a timelost modern scholar in a medieval Englandish land, is stuck with learning magic and devising unique solutions to problems). Those iterations of Magic are creative, hardly a list of spells that a stereotypical Magememorizes and then casts while adventuring.

I’m also influenced by the SquareSoft classic Secret of Evermore, which had a magic system built on “alchemy”, with reagents to mix for various effects. It was somewhere in between, with alchemical spell recipes and little room for experimentation, but a conceptual foundation of using real materials for magical effects, and elemental combinations that produced different effects. (This also forced players to choose between spells that shared ingredients, a curious tactical layer.)

It’s fair to note that many game players don’t necessarily want to be creative, they just want tools to blow up the bad guys, and an overly complex research and exploration system just bogs that sort of player down. Still, the mindset of a creative scientist/mage isn’t something that players often get to play with, and, well… it interests me. Perhaps there’s something viable in here, perhaps not, but since a large part of what I do here is explore, I may as well do so. I love to create game systems that let players explore and dig into possibilities. Less Team Ninja, more Sid Meier, as it were.

So, a few core thoughts I’m building on, though certainly not the only way to run this:

Magic is comprised of different ingredients, not unlike how matter is comprised of elements found in the periodic table. As such, magical ingredients mixed in different proportions and in different ways will produce a wide variety of effects.

Magic can be used for combat, utility, creation and destruction. Whether a high or low magic world, magic is pervasive, and used in everyday life. A blacksmith uses magic as readily as an archmage, albeit in different ways and to different ends. The spectrum of creativity, power and efficacy is probably wide, but magic itself is neither unusual nor inscrutable. It is almost a science, approachable by anyone with the will and intellect to master it. That said, mystics and religionists do cloak it in pomp and secrecy…

Magic uses both reagents and mental components (willpower, incantations, emotion, whatever), sometimes together. Totemic magic tends to be a mix of the two, for example. Pure material magic is mostly scientific, just with an expanded periodic table compared to what we’re used to. (Not unlike how dilithium in Star Trek’s magic, er, science fiction system is a variant of quartz with a subspace component… at least, according to some books that try to explain Trek.)

Magic underlies everything in reality, and as such, nearly everything can be manipulated by a sufficiently talented mage. Interconnections abound, and effects may be far-reaching, spatially or chronologically. The “fabric of reality” is literally envisioned by some, and manipulated as one might manipulate cloth, whether in gross maneuvers of grand sweeping curtains or subtle tweaks of single strings that touch others.

Magic is a form of energy, and is subject to magical laws of thermodynamics.

Magic can be seen, tasted, felt, heard and even smelled. A magical “sense” also exists, functioning as a gauge and locator.

Say, in one combat, if the orchestra is harmonious and the woodwinds are strongest, a healing wind helps you and your neighbors in an Area of Effect heal spell… but as the woodwinds tire out, you let their volume drop and make the brass section suddenly dissonant. Nearby foes are consequently blasted with summoned shrapnel. Most fall to the assault, but a few runners threaten to call down reinforcements. You quickly get the percussion ramped up to give yourself a speed boost, and shift the dissonance to the strings section for some shrill ranged attacks to take down the runners. Alternating between minor and major keys shifts your defense/offense balance, not unlike balancing speed, weapons and shields in an X-Wing from a central power pool.

Maybe altering the composition of your orchestra sections shifts elemental properties (more cellos, fewer violins means a slight Water edge to string attacks). Altering the balance of your orchestra (more woodwinds, less percussion) effectively shifts your combat focus. Enemy status attacks can alter this on the fly by targeting sections of your orchestra; you can be hamstrung by losing a few percussionists to a targeted sleep spell, for example.

To be sure, much of this particular design is just the Same Old stuff in a new cloak, what with elemental properties, ranged vs. melee combat and so on, just wielding a conductor’s baton, but it could prove interesting and even educational. It doesn’t all need to be about combat either, since environmental puzzles can be built around using music the right way. It’s almost like Zelda: The Ocarina of Time, where the titular Ocarina had magical effects… but in this case, you’re riffing on the magic musical spells as you go, weaving in new effects by changing the music. These changes can be subtle or gross, and need not even affect other effects. The strings can keep up a ranged barrage even as you use the brass and woodwinds to do different things.

Further, you can use music in different ways to deal with environmental or social puzzles. A soothing melody might make diplomacy easier (or a looming dissonant theme might make an ally more threatening to bluff through a situation), and a turbulent woodwind blast might clear a path through the brush.

Mr. Rosewater has made mention before of the various “knobs” that they have to tune their card designs. Mana cost and color are perhaps the biggest ones, but there are a whole host of mechanics and effects that get used on cards. Even the notion of card speed is a key knob to turn when considering combat resolution and priority on effect resolution. If those knobs were put in the hands of the player in a magical 4X game, where magic spells can be crafted and tuned based on a logical underpinning of constraints and components, you might see something a bit more creative than MOM, though with similar ends.

For example, a 2 mana spell using 1 Life mana, 1 Ether mana might create a Fate Runner if it’s a creature spell, but if it becomes a construction spell, it might be something like a Divine Presence enchantment, making local churches more effective. Same ingredients, different ends, all in the application.

That’s more of a prebaked recipe than creativity, though. Imagine then, if Life mana always served to make construction quicker, healing stronger, and creatures better defended. Tossing a spare Life mana into a particular spell you’re casting might not unlock a wholly new preconceived recipe, but it will have an effect on whatever it is you’re doing. It might enhance your efforts, or subtly shift them. Say, a Life mana rider on a Water/Fire creature summon; the creature doesn’t change its core form, but will be different from other creatures of the same species, say with a bolstered Faith attribute or better inherent leadership. A summoned creature with a Death mana rider might be more menacing, since it inherits a mild Fear aura.

Maybe location matters, too, and spells cast near a mana node are inherently more powerful, or perhaps they are more unstable (or both) due to some resonating interference in the magical leylines or some such. Perhaps sympathetic mana is enhanced by local leylines, and conflicting mana is diminished.

Further, if you can use that magic in various ways, say by molding the landscape and even interpersonal charm spells and such for the diplomacy segment, you step a little bit out of the “magic is for combat” mindset. If there are alternate win conditions, even constructive ones, magic might be used to bolster the methods to reach those ends. Imagine a mage who spent his time and research on new ways to build efficiently, and keep his people happy, earning a civil victory or some such, all the while befuddling or charming the socks off his neighbors (something MoM allowed, but the tools for that path were pretty limited). Magic could be bent to serve many different ends if it were sufficiently flexible.

Of course, devs might have to provide a set of “baseline” spells for players to use if they aren’t inclined to be creative. They would function like the various Mech chassis designs in BattleTech, letting players jump into the action… but rewarding those intrepid game explorers who min/max the living daylights out of complex systems. It does seem that 4X games tend to attract some of that sort of player, and complexity is more of a feature, less of a roadblock.

Interestingly, magic that is built from ingredients rather than recipes need not always behave predictably. Cooking in the real world sometimes produces unintended effects as ingredients intermingle in weird ways. Timing can also be an issue. Throw that Fire magic in early and the artifact sword infilcts a damage over time “slow burn”, but throw it in late in the forging and the sword carries a flame aura that chars (debuff) or flat out disintegrates targets.

It’s also worth noting that at some point, sure, you’re dealing with database management and the finite world of game development. Also, sufficiently dedicated players will datamine everything and post it in a FAQ. That said, in the meantime, players who want to experiment on their own will have tools to do so, and I want to encourage and reward that sort of experimentation.

At any rate, that’s just a pair off the top of my head, more brainstorming than polishing off a real proposal. There are certainly other directions to run with this.

One key might be to balance complexity with playability. It’s also important to avoid feature creep, with too much going on to be fun. Still, BattleTech, MoM, MtG and other games show that complexity isn’t antithetical to good design. Certainly, it has to make sense and serve the goals of the game, and the game should be playable without being a rocket scientist, but it really is nice to reward those players who want to dig a bit more into game systems.

Where would you take this and run with it? Is it possible to let players be chefs, playing in a magical kitchen to make crazy Rube Goldberg fun? Is it worth trying to develop that flexibilty when the mass market just wants WoW and God of War clones? I’m very curious to see what Elemental winds up doing, as a spiritual successor to MoM.

This is just a quick observation I noted whilst engaging in a little navel gazing as I thought further on the implications of WoW as an offline RPG, and how that has intersected with my recent play of Final Fantasy XII and Blue Dragon.

I find that I spend a good third or so of my time in WoW just looking around and taking screenshots. Maybe it’s because it’s still pretty new to me (I’ve not played it much because of the subscription model), maybe it’s because I love photography, maybe it’s because I like making desktop images, maybe it’s because I like to show my family cool stuff they might have missed when I played as the kids sleep, maybe it’s because I take pictures to look at for later dissection as a game artist or inspiration for sketching. Maybe I’m just weird.

Whatever the case, I have a lot of control over the camera in WoW compared to the typical console RPG. And then there’s that magnificent little button in the upper right of the keyboard:

Print Screen

I love that button. I spend more time playing PC games rather than console RPGs simply because I can’t take screenshots on the console. In WoW (and DDO and Allods and LOTRO and W101 and Puzzle Pirates and RoM and…) I can take screenshots of the game to my heart’s content… and my hard drive’s limit. I have literally thousands of screenshots across a handful of games. I do still have more pictures of “real life”, thanks to my handy dandy digital camera, but still, I take a LOT of pictures of things around me. Observation runs deep in my artistic and scientific blood.

I can’t do that with console RPGs… and honestly, it makes me a bit sad. You can’t take it with you, but sometimes, memories can be cemented a bit better if you have a picture to look at for more than the fleeting second that the event is “live”. This can be especially important in something like WoW, and my most recent “thirty days free with the box purchase” that I played through as the dauntless Tauren Druid Padgi. I can’t go back into the game until I pay for it again (pfft), so I took a lot of screenshots while I had access. As cool as the mapviewer is, you just have to get some things from the real game client.

Since I don’t have perpetual access to that, screenshots help satisfy any curiosity I may have about how Blizzard crafted the game. I can’t just fire up the game and look around any more, but I can look at my screenshots. (And yes, it’s probably ironic that I don’t do much with graphics around here. I keep meaning to change that with some art tutorials, at least… and y’know, slide shows of “my vacation in Azeroth” never seem to be all that popular.)

I can live with the pictures when the game itself is off limits. After all, I’m getting about a third of my usual WoW alt experience that way for a tiny fraction of the price. Value is in the eye of the beholder after all.

Also, tangentially, last time, Dblade noted (rightly, I think) that Role Playing servers are particularly susceptible to an influx of unwashed heathens. Would those who are really concerned about their little corner of the RP world be happier if they could just keep everyone out who didn’t have a club card? I mean, there are weirdos all over the place in these MMO things, you can never count on those other people doing things the right way. (Syp had me at “Sliders”. I loved that show’s early seasons…)

Of course, I must point out that with private servers, the sub model makes less sense once again. One may as well play with some mates over a LAN or just use someone’s spare desktop as a server. I’m sure many of those people already do so.

Would there be a market for legitimizing that segment of the player base? Or maybe, just maybe… sell the game like Guild Wars and let people play locally with friends (even solo… gasp!) without an internet tether to the mothership? Blizzard already subcontracts players as torrent bots for their download service, why not subcontract servers?

Sure, there will be layers of verification if someone plays “off the grid” and then wants to jack back into the matrix, but they could either just say “once on a private server, you stay there” or set up verification code in the private server sale package. (I know, I know, that’s not a trivial problem to solve… but hey, if you’re charging for the privilege of playing privately, there’s some money in the offering to pay for solving it, methinketh. I know we’ve blown the whole “cost-value” thing out of the water in MMOs, but still, using money to make the product itself better has a bit of history in commercial ventures.)

It is impractical, perhaps, for LOTRO or WoW to change that significantly… but might we see something like that in a future MMO? Really, if players are going to complain about those other players, the much-ballyhooed M for Massive in the acronym is already more like MIWFYQ rather than any sort of truly open, massively accessible world. (Maybe If We Feel You Qualify)

When I design a game, I want it long and deep enough to be interesting, but not so long and deep that it tires players. I want it accessible, but not infantile. I want it to be easy to learn and fun to play on a superficial level and/or by inexperienced players, but have enough complexity and intricacy that mastering it takes effort and feels rewarding. I want enough features to justify making the game in the first place, rather than a tech demo. I want to explore the implications of design choices without making busywork for the players. There is a sweet spot to hit where I have enough in the game to satisfy those admittedly vague goals, and doing too little or too much design detracts from the play experience.

I cannot recommend Mr. Rosewater’s articles enough. His archive is a treasure trove of game design considerations. Yes, he writes about designing a card game, but as he asserts in the Top Ten Principles articles, Good Design is Good Design, and some principles are universal across mediums. I agree, and it’s nice to see someone articulate it as well as Mr. Rosewater does, and as well as Mr. Rams does.

This is why, here at my workplace in a small game dev studio, we occasionally have game nights, where we play board or card games. Understanding why offline games work (with a side order of game theory, explicit or not) is valuable information when we get around to designing our video games. We have to understand the tools of our trade, and how design works.

One of the hardest things to learn is restraint. If I may, since art is the medium I’m most familiar with, a few thoughts on this notion as it’s found in the art world:

(Never mind that once you get to that level, we’re talking about a bizarre devotion to the craft of “doing it because I can” instead of just taking a photograph. It’s sort of like the artist equivalent of a No Sphere Grid Final Fantasy X game, or climbing Mount Everest carrying a grumpy rabid wombat in your pocket.)

Each can work nicely as a piece of Art, but they tend to evoke different responses. Some of that is strongly based in how much of the experience is left to the consumer, something that game designers should be intimately familiar with, seeing as how our medium is interactive by nature. (Which doesn’t invalidate it as an art medium, by the way.)

There comes a point in art where enough really is enough. One more brushstroke, one more visual element, and the composition changes, especially when working in sparse formats like the bamboo paintings. Sometimes that change is for the better, taking the piece in new directions, but many times, going just a wee bit too far makes the piece weaker. Sometimes it can even totally break the mood and aim of the piece. I’ve tossed away many of my sketches that I overworked.

This is part of why I enjoy sketching with ballpoint pens, and why I encourage other artists to do so as well. When you have to account for every move you make, as there is no erasing, you learn to carefully gauge what you do, and either make the right choice the first time, or learn to roll with mistakes and incorporate them into your work. These are valuable tools in an artist’s toolbox.

You could also work digitally, and use the almighty Undo command and History panel, and work with layers, which give you incredible control over your artworks if used properly. Many artists wind up working both digitally and traditionally, since both offer distinct advantages. I often sketch in pen, then scan it into the computer for the coloring with Painter or Photoshop.

…

Back to games, then, I’ve often seen Portal lauded as being a great game, even as it’s noted as being a short game. It’s just long enough to give players the chance to experiment with the implications of Portal mechanics and the various puzzle elements, and it’s not padded out with excessive repetition for the sake of making the game seem somehow meatier via time sinks (which are really just bloated fat, not real gaming meat). It hits a sweet spot of playability and proper exploration of game mechanics. It’s flat out, concentrated fun, even though it’s not a mega-epic sixty hour post-apocalyptic snark opera.

On the other hand, we have Final Fantasy XIII, known for its somewhat extensive tutorial. To be fair, they are different games with different ends, but the time spent differs by an order of magnitude. A significant difference like that needs to be something done by design and for a good reason, not just to pad out playtime. Whether FFXIII succeeds in that regard is arguable, but the argument is more vociferous than a similar argument about Portal’s scope and focus.

Portal tends to leave players itching for more, while FFXIII has some players crying to just get on with the game! MMOs can be even worse.

Oh, and scope might be one reason why we don’t have a Magic the Gathering MMO, while we’re talking MTG, MMOs and game design. The game is intricately and beautifully designed as it is, and trying to shoehorn that into an MMO makes for uncomfortable compromises. It’s possible to bend the MTG themes, lore and other assorted IP into an MMO, perhaps, and such crossgenre game design is possible… but doing so would mean effectively building a totally different game from the ground up, just with an existing IP. That doesn’t always work out. It means a different scope, a different focus, and ultimately, a different feel because it really is a different game. That can alienate fans of the existing lore, even as the existing lore already limits the audience if there are strong feelings about it among gamers or nongamers the product is trying to entice.

It might also be worth noting that stories are easier to tell when the storytelling format is a bit more focused than a series of grinds with cutscenes in between. At least, if story is important. It’s also worth noting that stories can have a fair amount of cruft and bloat in them as well, and one of the hardest parts of learning to write well is learning when to shut up, similar to how the best skill conversationalists learn is how to listen.

It’s a lesson I’m still learning, obviously, in writing and game design… but it’s one worth learning.

What with all the fuss over LOTRO’s impending renaissance (or doom, depending on your crystal ball), I’ve been idly wondering what server segregation might do to assuage the fears of the fans of gated communities (M.o.B. is asking for some civility there; he’s not one of the snoots). <snooty>One must keep the heathens out, after all; imagine what it might be like if they outnumbered the veteran “real players”. They don’t even play the right way. Maybe we should just autodelete all the noobs every week. At the very least, we should tell them to go home.</snooty>

Puzzle Pirates has separate “subscription” and “microtransaction” servers, for instance, and it seems to serve them well enough. Each server has its own community, politics and economy, though there is certainly cross-pollination on the master forums and players who play on multiple servers. Incidentally, the microtransaction servers have been most profitable for Three Rings, though they happily maintain both flavors. Players play on servers that match their finances; happy customers are a valuable asset. Even if they aren’t subscribers.

On another hand, you could go with a “scarlet letter” approach, as I noted over at KTR, if you’re working with an integrated community, and make it visible to one and all how players are paying for their gaming. Maybe that would make the Old Guard feel better, as they get their warm fuzzies by denigrating the little people. <snooty>Sit in the back of the boat, you, you… casuals and tourists! Respect my subscription-granted Authority!</snooty> I mean, we already have GearScore and Achievement segregation in WoW and other pecking order mechanics in other MMOs (“I can’t believe she’s wearing that gear, what a noob”), what’s the difference, right?

It really is interesting how these MMO things tinker with sociality.

Some also bemoan the rise of soloability, occasionally with similar utopian fervor. In my mind, though, the continuing democratization of the business models and game designs of these MMOs is a Good Thing. That’s how the free market works, ideally; innovation and experimentation provide for variety, and the most profitable ideas rise to the top. Sometimes, they even prove to be the best ideas, too. We’re not quite a meritocracy, but a varied market does tend to work better than One Size Fits All economic theory… ditto for game design. I mean, Turbine couldn’t possibly be paying attention to the industry, could they?

But hey, it’s a free world, right? If people want gated communities, they should be free to pay for them, right? Let the market decide, perhaps. There’s money to be made making people feel special… especially if those people will pay handsomely (through the nose) for prestige(For the Horde!). Conspicuous consumption, indeed; <snooty>what good are expensive toys if you can’t show them off and make other people feel inferior? What good is it to be a member of the subscription elite if you can’t lord it over the inbred masses of free to play tourists?

Why play with other people if you can’t be better than them? Even segregation only matters inasmuch as players know that there are other places they could be, but they don’t qualify because they aren’t as good as someone else because of how they pay for the game.</snooty>

Pfeh. Lovely post-prejudice society we live in, eh? It’s very interesting to see long-held but long-repressed opinions come out of the woodwork. Funny how time and stress do that to people; candid opinions are far more informative than processed ones. It’s especially curious to me that the prejudicial cancer of the LOTRO community is based on things that haven’t even happened yet. As such, the real problem for the community isn’t really an undefined nonpresent boogeyman, but the attitudes already held by those already in the community.